Method and apparatus for spinning of fibrous materials utilizing a rotary spinning chamber

ABSTRACT

IN THE SPINNING METHOD AND APPARATUS WHEREIN A SILVER OR ROVING IS FED TO A ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER TO BE RENDERED INTO A SPUN YARN BY BEING IMPARTED A DRAFT AND TWIST WHILE PASSING THERETHROUGH, A METHOD AND APPARATUS CHARACTERIZED IN THAT AT LEAST TWO ENDS OF THE SILVER OR ROVING ARE FED TO THE ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER, OF WHICH AT LEAST ONE OF THE SILVER OR ROVING IS DIRECTLY CONDUCTED TO A PORTION OTHER THAN THE COLLECTING SURFACE OF THE ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER, THAT IS, A LOCALITY CLOSE TO THE TWISTING POINT OF THE YARN BUNDLE WHICH IS DRAWN THERETO VIA THE COLLECTING SURFACE, THIS SILVER OR ROVING THUS PASSING THROUGH THE SPINNING CHAMBER TO BE IMPARTED ONLY A TWIST AND DRAFT WITHOUT BEING BROKEN, TO BE THEN COMBINED WITH THE OTHER SILVER OR ROVING WHICH HAS BEEN DELIVERED VIA THE COLLECTING SURFACE.

Sept. 20, 1971 TAKASHl om w ETAL 3,605,395

uswuon AND APPARATUS FOR snuume 0F msnous MATERIALS UTILIZING A ROTARY srmume cmasa Filed June 3. 1968 5 Sheets-Shoat 1 INVIiN'lOR.

Sept. 20, 1971 TAKASH] MORIKAWA ETAL 3,605,395

METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SPINNING op FIBROUS MATERIALS A UTILIZING A ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER Filed June 3. 1968 5 Sheets-Sheet 2 Fig.2

IN VENTOR.

Sept. 20, 1911 TAKASHI MORIKAWA ETAL 3,505,395

METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SPINNING 0E FIBROUS MATERIALS Filed June 5, I968 UTILIZING A ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER 5 Sheets-Sheet 5 IN VENT!) R.

To rn sA M 6+ W p 20, 1971 TAKASHI MORIKAWA ETA!- 3,505,395

METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SPINNING OF FIBROUS MATERIALS UTILIZING A ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER Filed June 5. 1968 I 5 Sheets-Sheet 0 IN VENTOR.

muni- Sept. 20, 1971 TAKASHl MORlKAWA ETAL 3,605,395

- METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SPINNING 0F FIBROUS MATERIALS UTILIZING A ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER Filed June 5. 1968 5 Sheets-Sheet 5 INVENTOR. 4M434 Mom/mun B) c 7 19 United States Patent 01 hoe 3,605,395 Patented Sept. 20, 1971 3,605,395 METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SPINNING OF FIBROUS MATERIALS UTILIZING A ROTARY SPINNING CHAMBER Takashi Morikawa, Amagasaki-shi, Tatuo Horiuchi, Hirakata-shi, Mitugi Sumi, Fukui-shi, and Tadanori Kurushima, Hirakata-shi, Japan, assignors to Daiwa Boseki Kabushiki Kaisha, Osaka, Japan Filed June 3, 1968, Ser. No. 733,866 Claims priority, application Japan, June 5, 1967, 42/136,134; Aug. 9, 1967, 42/51,383 Int. Cl. D01h N12 US. Cl. S758.89 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE In the spinning method and apparatus wherein a sliver or roving is fed to a rotary spinning chamber to be rendered into a spun yarn by being imparted a draft and twist while passing therethrough, a method and apparatus characterized in that at least two ends of the sliver or roving are fed to the rotary spinning chamber, of which at least one of the sliver or roving is directly conducted to a portion other than the collecting surface of the rotary spinning chamber, that is, a locality close to the twisting point of the yarn bundle which is drawn thereto via the collecting surface, this sliver or roving thus passing through the spinning chamber to be imparted only a twist and draft without being broken, to be then combined with the other sliver or roving which has been delivered via the collecting surface.

The invention relates to a method and apparatus for continuous spinning of fibrous textile materials. More particularly, the invention relates to a method and apparatus of the type utilizing a rotary spinning chamber.

Lately, aside from the spinning methods by means of the conventional ring and traveller, there has been provided a spinning method which utilizes a rotary spinning chamber, the yarn being spun by feeding a sliver or roving, which will hereinafter be referred to as staple fibers, to the rotary spinning chamber where it is broken and imparted a draft and twist while passing therethrough. It is well-known that this spinning method has a great advantage over the conventional ring spinning technique in that a pronounced enhancement in productivity can be realized, the cost of production can be reduced, a reduction in labor required can be expected, and a larger package can be obtained. However, the greatest shortcoming of the spun yarn obtained by this spinning method is that its strength (tensile strength) is inferior by 15- 25% than the spun yarn obtained by the ring-traveller spinning technique, although it is superior with respect to the latter in its bulkiness and uniformity. This shortcoming is ascribable to such facts as that the yarn spun by this method is bulky, the fiber parallelism thereof is irregular, its proportion of curved and looped fibers is great, etc. In consequence the problem for which solution has been demanded all along is that of raising the strength of this spun yarn to an extent as to make it comparable to that of the conventional ring-spun yarn.

The present invention has been directed to the elimination of the aforesaid shortcoming and has achieved this by feeding at least two ends of staple fibers to the rotary spinning chamber, to one of which staple fibers only twist and draft are imparted, and thereafter combining this with the other staple fibers to obtain a single end of spun yarn. That is to say, the strength of the spun yarn obtained has been increased by increasing the proportion occupied by those fibers which are aligned axially of the running yarn.

The feature of the present invention resides in feeding two or more ends of staple fibers to a single rotary spinning chamber, imparting only a draft and twist to at least one of the ends of staple fibers without breaking it in the rotary spinning chamber, and thereafter combining these two or more ends of staple fibers followed by taking up the resulting composite yarn from the rotary spinning chamber and winding it up.

An object of the present invention is to provide a spinning method and apparatus by which spun yarn having great parallelism of the fibers can be obtained by means of the method utilizing a rotary spinning chamber.

Another object of the invention is to provide a variety of composite yarns by adjusting, as desired, the speed at which the yarn is taken up from the rotary spinning chamber and wound.

A further object of the invention is to provide a composite yarn of great strength and bulkiness by substituting a filament yarn for at least one of the staple fibers.

Other objects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description, drawings and the appended claims.

An embodiment of the invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein FIGS. 1 and 2 are vertical sectional views illustrating the principal parts of the invention apparatus, a mode being shown of making a spun yarn in which the two ends of fibrous material fed are of the same staple fiber, FIG. 3 being a plan view of FIG. 2; FIG. 4 illustrates a mode of making a covered yarn (core yarn) with the apparatus shown in FIG. 1; and FIG. 5 is a vertical sectional view of an apparatus similar to the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 a spinning mode of a core-incorporated coiling yarn being shown.

In the drawings, similar numerals refer to the same parts of the embodiments.

While according to the present invention a pair of rollers is shown as the means for feeding the fibrous materials to the rotary spinning chamber, fibrous materials that are to be broken may be fed directly from an opening roller.

Reference numeral 1 designates the funnel-shaped spinning chamber capable of high speed rotation disposed between the feed rollers 2 and take-up rollers 3 and having a fiber collecting surface at its inner peripheral wall. A stationary cap 5 covers the fiber inlet side of the spinning chamber 1. Numeral 6 designates a stationary supply tube whose inlet side 7 is positioned adjacent to the feed rollers 2 while its outlet side 8 faces the fiber collecting surface 4 of spinning chamber 1. Numeral 9 designates a guide pipe which passes through the cap 5 in approximately its middle part, 10 is a discharge opening of the spinning chamber 1 and 11 is a cross winding mechanism for winding in cheese form yarn 12 leaving the take-up rollers 3.

Referring to FIG. 1, fibrous materials (coarse yarn or sliver), two ends of which make up a set, are delivered as two ends of staple fibers or fiber ribbon fleeces S S from feed rollers 2, spaced with a suitable interval H, via a conventional drafting mechanism (not shown), to a single rotary spinning chamber 1. Fiber ribbon fleece S one of these two ends, is fed into the stationary supply tube 6 whose inlet side is adjacent the feed rollers 2 and outlet side 8 faces the fiber collecting surface 4 of the rotary spinning chamber 1. The peripheral wall of the fiber collecting surface 4 of rotary spinning chamber 1 is provided with numerous perforations 13, and either by the high speed rotation of the rotary spinning chamber 1 or by the addition suitably of a suction means (not shown), reduced pressure is set up inside the rotary spinning chamber 1, with the consequence that an air current in the direction of arrow (a) is set up in the stationary supply tube 6 to result in breaking the fiber ribbon fleece S which has been delivered into the stationary supply tube 6, followed by conveying and adhering the fibers to the fiber collecting surface 4 of rotary spinning chamber 1 and thereafter twisting the fibers while withdrawing the fibers by means of the pair of take-up rollers 3 via the discharge opening of rotary spinning chamber 1. On the other hand, the fiber ribbon fleece S the other end, is fed to the guide pipe 9 provided in approximately the middle of the stationary cap 5, which covers the fiber inlet side of the funnel-shaped rotary spinning chamber 1. Fiber ribbon fleece S which has passed through the guide pipe 9, is directly delivered to twisting point 14 of the aforementioned fiber ribbon fleece S or in the vicinity thereof, without being made to adhere to the fiber collecting surface 4 of rotary spinning chamber 1, at which point it is caused to be drawn into the twisting action of the aforesaid fiber ribbon fleece S following which the two fleeces S S are combined at the inclined surface 15 of rotary spinning chamber 1, thus obtaining a twisted yarn 12. Since the twisted yarn 12 while in contact with the inclined surface 15 rotates together with the rotary spinning chamber 1 at this time, a ballooning phenomenon of the latter fleece S is set up between the discharge end 16- of guide pipe 9 and the twisting point 14 and, as a result, a slight twist is transmitted to the fleece S at between the guide pipe 9 and the feed rollers 2, thereby preventing the breakage of the fleece S and making its continuous feed possible. Further, yarn at between the guide pipe 9 and the twisting point 14 is fully stretched by being subjected to the pulling action of the aforesaid ballooning phenomenon, and then is twisted in and combined with the fleece S to form a single end of twisted yarn 12. The so formed twisted yarn is successively withdrawn by the take-up rollers 3 and wound on the winding rollers 17 in cheese formby means of the cross winding mechanism 11.

In the embodiment shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, the rotary spinning chamber 1 is placed inside a box frame 20. Box frame 20 is provided with a suction hole 21 which is in communication with a suitable suction means (not shown), whereby the inside of said box frame is reduced to below atmospheric pressure and at the same time the pressure inside the rotary spinning chamber is also reduced to below atmospheric pressure by means of the perforations 13 of the rotary spinning chamber 1. This embodiment is provided with a straight inclined stationary supply tube 6 for pneumatically conveying the fleece S delivered from the feed rollers 2 to the fiber collecting surface 4 of rotary spinning chamber 1, thus permitting the smooth conveyance of the fiber, but otherwise functions practically in the same manner as the embodiment illustrated in FIG. 1, two ends of fiber ribbon fleeces S S being made into a single end of twisted yarn in the same fashion.

In forming a single end of spun yarn 12, as hereinbefore described, by feeding two ends of fiber ribbon fleeces S S to a single rotary spinning chamber 1, the ratio of the peripheral speed A of feed rollers 2, which feed the fiber fleeces S S to the peripheral speed B of the take-up rollers 3, which take up the combined fleeces S S as a spun yarn 12, is of great significance in forming the spun yarn 12. A difference in the ratio of rollers 2 to 3 varies the appearance and properties of the spun yarn 12. As a result of numerous experiments, it was found that a ratio of A:B of 1:0.85-0.96- should be used for obtaining a normal desirable spun yarn. That is to say, when a ratio of A:B of above 110.96 is used, the point at which the two ends of fleeces S S combine and become twisted together becomes remote from the fiber collecting surface 4 of rotary spinning chamber 1, with the consequence that twisted fleece S wound about the fleece S as the core assumes a Wisteria twist form. On the other hand, when the ratio of A:B of less than 1:O.84 is used, in contradistinction to the above case, fleece S wraps about the twisted fleece S to become like a core yarn. Since the structure of the yarn made by combining the two ends of fleeces S S thus varies depending upon the peripheral speeds of the feed rollers 2 and the take-up rollers 3, a choice of the ratio between the rollers may be made in accordance with what is desirable depending upon the use to which the product is to be put. However, the common spun yarn can be obtained when the peripheral speed of the take-up rollers 3 is operated at a slightly lower speed than that of the feed rollers 2.

In FIGS. 4 and 5 are illustrated modes wherein, of the two ends of fibrous materials to 'be fed, one endis a ribbon fleece S composed staple fibers, whereas the other end is a synthetic multifilament S and the two ends are combined as hereinbefore described, to obtain yarns having the synthetic multifilament yarn as a core about which the staple fiber fleece S is wrapped or wrapped and covered. In this case, the fibrous material composed of staple fibers is fed to the stationary supply tube 6, while the fibrous material of synthetic multifilament yarn is fed to the guide pipe 9.

Thus, as hereinbefore described, since in the invention method and apparatus two ends of fibrous materials delivered from the feed rollers are fed to a single rotary spinning chamber wherein one of the two ends of fibrous materials is caused to be conveyed to and adhered to the fiber collecting surface of the rotary spinning chamber, to be then successively withdrawn and imparted a twisting action, whereas the other of the two ends of fibrous materials is directly fed to the twisting point of the former fibrous material, or the vicinity thereof, where the two fibrous materials are combined into a single yarn, the uniformity of the resulting yarn, when the two ends of fibrous materials are of the same staple fibers, is improved by the doubling eflFect of the two fibrous materials, and since staple fibers fed from the feed rollers and having no irregularities in their parallelism are fed directly to the twisting point or vicinity thereof and combined with the staple fibers which have been conveyed from the stationary supply tube via the fiber collecting surface, the yarn obtained contains a lesser proportion of curved fibers and looped fibers than the yarn spun by the conventional open end spinning method and its strength is hence increased.

Further, by using as one of the two ends of fibrous materials a ribbon fleece composed of staple fibers and as the other a synthetic multifilament, a single end of covering yarn or core-incorporated coiling yarn can be made in a single step.

In addition, since a ring-traveller is not used, the hereinbefore described various kinds of yarns can be produced at high speeds. Hence, this contributes to the reduction in the cost of the products.

We claim:

1. A method of preparing a single twisted end of yarn comprising the steps of feeding a first end of staple fibers into a spinning chamber and directing the first fiber end against a fiber collecting surface in the chamber; drawing the first fiber end from the chamber to twist the first fiber end and define a twisting point spaced from the fiber collecting surface; feeding a second end of staple fibers directly to the twisting point; twisting the first and second fiber ends together into a single twisted end of yarn; and taking up the single twisted end of yarn.

2. The method as recited in claim 1 wherein said feed ing steps include feeding the first and second fiber ends at a first speed, and said taking-up step includes taking up the single twisted end of yarn at a second speed slightly less than the first speed.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the staple fibers are slivers or rovings.

4. Spinning apparatus for forming a single twisted end of yarn comprising feed means for feeding first and second ends of staple fibers; take-up means; a funnel-shaped spinning chamber having an inlet, an outlet and an inner fiber collecting surface, said chamber being disposed between said feed means and said take-up means to receive said first and second fiber ends from said feed means at said inlet and deliver a single twisted end of yarn through said outlet to said takeup means; a stationary cap covering said inlet of said chamber; a stationary supply tube supported by said cap for receiving said first fiber end and directing said first fiber end against said-.fiber collecting surface, said first fiber end being drawn along said fiber collecting surface and being twisted by the spinning of said chamber at a twisting point spaced from said fiber collecting surface; and a guide pipe extending through the center of said cap for receiving said second fiber end, said guide pipe having an outlet spaced from said chamber outlet to deliver said second fiber end to said twisting point whereby said first and second fiber ends are combined to form a single twisted end of yarn at said chamber outlet.

6 5. An apparatus according to claim 4 wherein said stationary supply tube is straight and disposed at an inclined angle to the rotational axis of said spinning chamber.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 3,132,465 5/1964 Putnam 57-58.89 3,445,993 5/1969 Vorisek 57-58.95 3,501,907 3/1970 Tabata et a1 5758.89X 3,523,300 8/1970 Tabata et al 57-58.91 3,535,868 10/1970 Schiltknecht 57-58.95

JOHN PET RAKES, Primary Examiner US. Cl. X.R. 

